Why were Daniel Craig’s suits so ill-fitting in Spectre?

King & Allen was founded in 2003, and Casino Royale was released in 2006. Naturally, we have followed Daniel Craig’s sartorial journey with great interest and have loved almost all the suits he has worn.

The suits in Spectre, however, were a great disappointment.

In an article he never wanted to have to write, King & Allen co-founder, Adam King, highlights the howling fit, style and quality errors exhibited in the film…

The Jackets were too tight

One of the things I love about Bond films is the almost religious discipline towards sartorial perfection. This is epitomised in The World is Not Enough when Pierce Brosnan fixes his tie underwater (his finest moment?). Daniel Craig’s suits are no exception. He always buttons his jacket – even in the most impractical situations.

In doing so, however, he highlights just how ill-fitting his suits are. When a jacket is too tight, there are tell-tale ripples that emanate from the centre button, and these were highly evident throughout the film. How were these issues not rectified? Surely Craig, himself, was uncomfortable throughout the months of filming?. If you’re wondering how a suit should actually fit, we’ve written a whole article dedicated to the topic. If only Mr Craig’s stylist had read it…

The jackets were too short

Furthermore, the jackets were far too short. This is Bond – not the Arctic Monkeys circa 2011!

Daniel Craig is just shy of six feet tall and is physically very well proportioned. In other words, there is no physical reason why he should require a short jacket (e.g. to overcompensate for short legs). This is simply poor styling.

I appreciate that providing suits for a film is an expensive business. Rumours are that the Mexico scene, alone, required 85 suits. In an interview with The Telegraph, Craig explains the process…

“If you think about a fight sequence where I get cut or the other guy gets cut and that’s 30 seconds into the sequence. So however long it takes to shoot 30 seconds, which can be a day, we need one suit for that day, another suit for the next day… So every stage of the fight has a different suit because it’s broken down in a different way.” The problem for the fans (apart from the fact that the suits aren’t British) is that they’re not bespoke. Daniel Craig has a very muscular shape. Off-the-peg suits will simply not fit him.

Unfortunately, Tom Ford doesn’t make bespoke suits, so Craig’s suits will be made-to-measure at best, or just taken off the shelves and adjusted to fit. Watching the film, you’d be forgiven for thinking someone had just grabbed a suit off the rack (blindfolded?) and not adjusted them at all.

I doubt Tom Ford gives the cost much consideration. Off-the-peg suits are so much cheaper to make, so they are relatively disposable.

Poor quality tailoring

In one scene (Mexico), as Bond has his back to the camera, I noticed puckering all the way down the back seam of the jacket. That’s nothing to do with fit – that’s poor quality stitching.

These things may seem trivial, but Bond is integral to our national heritage, celebrating so much that is Great about Britain. Along with the cars and the gadgets, the suits are a very significant part of the brand. And if we start to let standards slip, we could lose it forever.

Our Top 20 Bond Suits of All Time

Since Spectre left a lot to be desired, in regards to great tailoring, take a look at our round up of the Top 20 James Bond Suits of All Time.

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